BAIC Initially Reorganizes Fuqi Daimler GAC or Will Acquire Southeast Automotive

The reporter learned from related parties that although the company had just lost its interest in Opel in overseas acquisitions, it has reached an agreement with Fuzhou for the Daimler project affiliated to Fujian Automobile Group, and will formally sign the contract in the near future.

It is understood that the acquisition involved by BAIC will be the most complicated vehicle-level restructuring project in China so far. In addition to negotiations with GAC and BAIC, Fushun also has cooperation with Daimler-Benz, Mitsubishi, Chrysler, and Taiwan-China Motors. It is difficult to imagine the acquisition. The latest news also shows that Guangzhou Automobile may eventually acquire Southeast Motor, while BAIC will take Fuming Daimler's project into the bag.

Compared with the Southeast project that Guangzhou Automobile is facing, BAIC's acquisition target is relatively weak and relatively difficult to acquire. Fujian Daimler is almost a brand-new company because BAIC and Daimler have always been close partners. They have cooperation projects such as Beijing Benz and Foton Daimler. It is expected that after this integration, the Daimler project under Fuzhou Automobile will be transformed into a Beijing Benz subsidiary, which will mainly run commercial vehicle projects. Senior analyst Jia Xinguang said that since the Fujian Daimler project is almost a brand-new company, the property rights are relatively clear, and there is no historical burden, so the biggest possibility is that Beiqi directly takes over 50% of Fujian Daimler's shares.

In fact, as early as three years ago, Fuqi and Beiqi had discussed cooperation issues. Chairman of Fuqi, Ling Yuzhang, also publicly stated, “We can share certain resources with BAIC, such as the sedan engine. In fact, Mercedes-Benz establishes these two projects in China and it will benefit everyone.” And three years later, the real Cooperation is coming soon.

According to reports, Fujian Daimler Automotive Industry Co., Ltd. was established in May 2007 with a total investment of 249 million euros and a registered capital of 160 million euros. Among them, 50% were from Fuqi, and Daimler Light Automotive (Hong Kong) Co., Ltd. (a joint venture between Daimler Group and Taiwan Zhonghua Automobile) accounted for 50% of the shares. The annual production capacity of the project is 40,000, and the products are the "Benz" brand NCV2, NCV3 series multi-functional light vehicles. Construction started in August 2007 and the first product, NCV2, was put into production in 2009.

For the funds involved in this merger, the industry generally thinks it is not big. According to the analysis, the Fujian Daimler project was officially completed in February this year and is still in the trial production stage. In August of this year, the product may formally go offline. “Before this, Beijing Automobile's overall acquisition of Fuqi was set at a total amount of 500 million yuan, and later it was raised to less than 700 million yuan. Therefore, the funds used for this split acquisition may be a very small number,” the source revealed.

In addition, after the acquisition of Changfeng by GAC Group, it is also implicating Fudan's Southeast Motor Corporation. However, due to the turnaround in South East Motor, and the acquisition of Taiwan Zhonghua’s shares in Southeast Motor, its acquisition plan is not going smoothly.